Vuelo Alto Con Mi Mente III

30 x 22.5 inches

Collage with Linoleum Block, Photo Transfer, and Monoprint Elements on Cotton Rag Paper

2022

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This series is about healing and moving through deep grief. I created these works when I was going through emotional hardship due to a friendship break up. I really loved my friend and I wasn’t able to get the closure I wanted and needed. So I had to find ways to move through grief and through many unanswered questions. There comes a point when you have to do your own healing because the other person is not ready or willing to engage, or sometimes there isn’t value alignment about how to move through conflict.

Things felt hard for a few months as I grieved the friendship, and so I made it a point to spend a lot of time with other friends who were willing to hear about my grief, and hold it, and support me with it. I also leaned into my connection with nature. I spent a lot of time in the forest because that brought me some peace and I could talk to trees about my grief, thus releasing it.

Sometimes I would be driving through the Redwoods or along the coast of California. I would listen to different songs that brought me memories from the friendship that had ended and I would feel like I was flying through the past, learning how to appreciate these special moments. 

These prints are about how my imagination helped me value the past and create a quilt of memories that centered love, not resentment. I realized that I had agency in how I could deal with this situation. I could move towards anger or I could simply appreciate what was, and value each moment and memory. So I chose the latter. 

I love the process of how this series was created. I’ve really been evolving my patterns and creating a library of different textures of things that I love, whether it's close ups of marijuana leaves or close ups of beans or images of my favorite mountains or shots of the ocean or a blend of my doodles. 

I’ve compiled a library of textures and colors that I cut and remix to create beautiful works. If you look closely at the different elements, you will see a variety of depths and patterns that have all been meticulously created.